Jungle Friends Soft Book

Pattern/Technique: Jungle Friends fabric panel by Stacy Iest Hsu for Moda Fabrics (purchased from Stitch Supply Co.)

Modifications: none

New skills: n/a

Lessons/Notes: The grain on the fabric panel was quite off in places, making some of the pages warped. For the large pages I compensated for this by cutting out the page, folding it in half so that the short edges were aligned, then ironing toward the folded edge (essentially a version of the Harriet Hargrave method for straightening fabric grain in Quilters Academy vol. 1).

Note: I’m now realizing that maybe it would have made more sense to try straightening the grain for the whole panel before cutting out any pieces, though I didn’t notice it was so far off until after cutting - definitely a thing to pay attention to if I make another one of these.

This project called for a lot of interfacing and fusible fleece so I got to use up a bunch of that weird papery Pellon Featherweight I bought a while ago. I may have misread the instructions for the cover page, and interfaced the interior side with single-sided interfacing, but I don’t think the extra stability hurt anything.

Sewing both sides of the pages together was a little tricky with the non-stabilized fabric side up (quite a bit of shifting/stretching), but much easier with the fusible fleece side up.

Used my trick of marking the start/stop point of my seam with red pins.

Sewing around tight corners is a skill I’m trying to improve and I saw better results when sewing at a slow but steady pace (vs. stopping frequently) and really bossing the fabric around curves. Just have to continue to practice.

What I’d do differently: Check panel grain distortion before cutting out pieces. Overall this was a really quick and satisfying little project - I’d love to make another one in the future.

Care: Machine wash, dry flat

Totoro Bean Plushie

Pattern/Technique: Grey Totoro Amigurumi Pattern by Lucy Collin

Modifications: Left off tail, arms, and embroidery on tummy

Materials: Knitpicks Swish DK in Marble Heather (3 skeins), Coal (1 skein), White (1 skein)

US E (3.5 mm) crochet hook

9mm safety eyes

New skills: n/a

Lessons/Notes: A pretty straightforward project. I don’t love seaming and was running out of grey yarn, so I simplified and left off a bunch of little details like the tummy embroidery and arms/tail, but the finished project is still Totoro, albeit a minimalist version.

Past Lauren didn’t add much stuffing in the main body, so I unpicked the woven-in ends and poked in a bunch more poly fill to make it more rigid. I’m mainly worried about it compacting and getting lumpy/floppy with use, so the extra filling should help prevent that.

I’m really happy with how the nose turned out: I embroidered a bunch of horizontal stitches, making them longer in the middle and slightly shorter at the top/bottom and layering multiple stitches to get a 3D tapered nose.

What I'd do differently: I think I might have ended up with slightly different length ears and slightly off axis placement of the eyes, both of which I’ll chalk up as “proof of hand”.

Care: Hand wash, dry flat